The Phantom of Rock
by Market Square Heroes
Summary: A rock band get magically transported back in time to 1886, Paris. Having no idea how they got there and how to get back, they try to find a roof over their heads and money in order to survive. The restored Opera House serves as the perfect place for this
1. Arrival

**Well...this is one heck of a big chapter! Though, don't take it for granted! I just had a big spurt of creative and imaginative energy - and this is the result :)**

**This story is set 2 years after the fire, which I decided to set in 1884 - so my story is set in 1886. Wow, I can count! Anyways, there is this American band that come from the year 2007. It is a group of 6 people that have just come together but the band is still unsigned. They somehow get mysteriously transported back to the year 1886. To top all of that, they end up in a foreign country...you don't even need to guess where that would be:)**

**Now that they are stuck in this new time zone and country, the only thing they can do is try and earn money in order to live. The now restored Opera Garnier (formerly known as The Opera Populaire) serves as the ideal place for them to live and show their musical talents. The band members; Steve, Mark, Eddie, Laura, Hannah and Rachelle form an even closer friendship bond in order to stick together in this (for them) strange new world (or old, if you think about it). **

** Not that long after their talents are recognised, do this strange group of people catch the attention of The Opera Ghost himself! Of course he is still alive and well - but still bitter about the past events in his life and is still possessive of _his _Opera house and how it should be run. Everyone thinks he had died in the fire that fateful night, but they are sorely mistaken. **

**There is one person in particular who catches The Phantom's eye the most. Rachelle. At first for her limitless talents, but his admiration and curiosity of her gradually grows into something much, much more...ENJOY!  
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The Phantom of Rock 

You may very well ask how the hell this happened. Why did this happen? Well, to be perfectly honest, I'm no wiser than you. I haven't a clue what I'm doing here or how this even occurred. However, what I do know is that it was done for a reason. Unfortunately, I don't know exactly what this reason is but I refuse to believe that this kind of thing happened just for the sake of it. You want to know what happened? You might think I'm lying, and I wouldn't blame you, because at first I couldn't even believe it myself.

Time travel. Many people have pondered over the possibility of this being able to be achieved. And many have given up on the theory. However, now I know it is possible. I just never intended for it to happen, that's the problem. I don't know how to get back. This made me realise that there is obviously a much greater power than any man could ever imagine that was controlling our destiny right now. Something or someone had brought us here, and I am determined to find out whom. Even if it will mean the death of me. Maybe there is a God, or some other superior being who had created mankind and who had sent us here. But for now, I just don't know.

However, I am not the only person who has been brought here. The whole of the band came with me too. All of them as confused as me. I wondered why a rock band from the 21st century would be taken here, back in time. We are still yet to try and find out what exact year we are now in, but we are all certain that it is definitely the 19th century. It was the strangest thing. The last thing I remember was all of us staying at my apartment for a relaxing night in, eating popcorn and watching The Phantom of the Opera, much to the chagrin of Eddie who hates it (for some weird reason, who wouldn't love it?). Then there was a blinding flash of light and the room felt like it was spinning, spinning faster and faster and then there was the sensation of falling. Then THUMP! We all landed on a hard cobbled stone street. Thanking god that it was pitch black and that no one was around, otherwise we would have caught a lot of unwanted attention.

Now, here we are. Having no idea which country we are in. The name of the town or city. Most important of all, what exact year, date and time it now is. I have never felt any more completely lost in my entire life. Not even the feeling of being stranded in the middle of a desert would come anything near to this.

It took us a while to get our bearings and to realise what had just transpired. One by one we stood up with much difficulty considering what had happened before as it felt like we had fallen many feet, and the rough cobbled street had done nothing to help that fall. I was quite surprised that none of us had been hurt or injured! Still recovering from the shock, we were in no condition to talk just yet. Instead we took in our surroundings, and what we saw left us gawking. We knew it could be no trick - everything looked too real.

"What the fuck is going on here? We were just watching a movie!" Mark exclaimed breathlessly as if he had been running a marathon for hours.

"Well, thanks for stating the obvious, Mr. Smarty pants!" Eddie mocked and laughed at Mark's expression of confusion and disappointment. He always revelled in the moments when he could make fun out of Mark - something that I have never understood the point of.

"Hey! Unlike you, I was actually interested in what would happen to the Phantom at the end of the movie!" Mark folded his arms in defence. Me, and the rest of the band stood back knowing all too well _not_ to get involved in this situation, especially when it concerned these two. However, I knew I had to stop this before it went too far like the many other times for all of our sakes. I just was having difficulty in trying to find the right time to butt in.

"We don't find out what happens to the Phantom at the end of the movie you dumb ass! Anyway, he's not real! You're such a kid-"

"Alright, that's enough! This is neither the time nor the place to start arguing. You two should know better and Eddie, stop being such a provocative fucker! Has it not occurred to you that falling out with each other is the last thing that we should be doing right now? We haven't got the foggiest where we are, let alone by the looks of things, what year it is!" After my outburst, no one dared argue with me, even the likes of Eddie. I wasn't usually the one for shouting, but when I did, people knew not to push me any further.

"Now that you've calmed down, we can look at the bigger picture. First things first, where are we?" There was a long silence. Everyone glanced around wearingly and then back at me again. Then Eddie in his usual sarcastic tone remarked,

"Well, I was kind of hoping that you would know."

"If she knew, do you think that she would ask?" Hannah piped up from behind Steve and Laura who had remained mute during the whole ordeal, still in disbelief over what had happened. Then I noticed Steve was looking down the street and a piece of paper that was fluttering around due to the slight breeze. It was blowing towards us slowly and Steve walked ahead to pick it up. From where I was standing, it looked like the loose front page of a newspaper.

They all gathered round Steve to take a closer look. I heard several gasps and incoherent mutterings, which did nothing to settle my curiosity and I started to get anxious and impatient.

"What is it you guys?" Steve was still holding the paper in his hands and was the only one who looked up at me. Everyone else had their heads in their hands or had sat down at the edge of the pavement, their faces pale with shock. This was when my heart started to beat faster and I stepped closer to him preparing myself for the worst, for what I was about to see.

Steve extended his arm and hesitantly handed the piece of paper over to me. Looking down I read out the title,

**Le Parisien Temps**

**du dimanche 16 Novembre 1886**

I stood there, not uttering one word for what felt like an eternity. I couldn't and didn't believe it at first but as I kept on rereading the title of the paper and the date, it began to dawn on me that it was true. I even pinched myself in the arm just to make sure that this wasn't some weird dream.

"Ouch!" Everyone's head whipped round to face me. I could feel my face flush and I forced on a weary smile to hide my discomfort. Letting out a nervous laugh, I spoke once more half to them, and half to myself,

"Rum, I suppose that answers two of our questions. We're in 19th century Paris..." I glanced away from them feeling uneasy and slightly sick in the stomach. Too much was happening at the same time.

"Paris?" Mark asked confused.

"Yeah Paris you dumb ass! As in Paris, France - voulez-vous couchez avec moi, ce soir? Get the picture? Actually, to give you more of an idea, the story of The Phantom of the Opera was based her-"

"Oi! I know where Paris is! And I'd rather not sleep with you, but thanks for the offer." He added dryly. "Anyway, I was just surprised that's all. I mean, last time I remember, we were in Rachelle's flat in New York!" Eddie was just about to retort when Laura stepped in between the two.

"Yeah, it's not everyday that you suddenly end up on the other side of the world in a different time zone."

"Exactly, but this could all just be one silly hoax..." Mark suggested. "I must say, it's a very convincing one though."

"We can't know for certain whether this is real or not because there are no people out. If we could ask someone-" Eddie cut Steve off,

"-I think we would have to ask quite a few people. If this is all a 'hoax' then the people would be too, wouldn't they?" There was a pause as all of us contemplated what had just been discussed - to try and find a solution. Then I spoke up again,

"Well, we will just have to hope that they will be telling the truth. It's the only thing we can do." Everyone nodded, but Eddie the skeptic still had his brows bunched up in a frown. "Eddie... please, we need to be together on this one." At moments like these, I couldn't help imagine Eddie as 'Grumpy' from the story 'Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs'. He could be so stubborn, but inside I knew that he had a kind heart. All my friends relied on me to calm him down when he got worked up. They thought I could tame the wildest of tempers - but thankfully, he was not being as bad as he could be tonight.

"Okay, whatever..." I smiled at him to try and clear the tense air around us. Eddie just rolled his eyes and focused his attention on something else in the distance. I took this as a good sign and left it at that.

"Urm, I don't see any people about yet. I mean, it's night time...we might have to wait a while." Hannah said whilst shivering because of the cold that was slowly starting to bite through our clothing. I then felt someone elbowing me and looked up. It was Eddie with an inquisitive look in his eyes.

"Rachelle, look over there." I did as he said and saw to my right only a few feet away, a carriage with two horses tied up in front of it. What I thought was odd was that it was just standing right in the middle of the cobbled street. Even though I had no experience about where people parked their 'vehicles' in the 19th century, I was sure that they didn't just leave them in the middle of the road.

"That's weird..." I thought out loud. "It must have been there all along. Why didn't we notice it before?"

"I suppose we were all quite preoccupied in finding out where the hell we are." Eddie jokily explained. I nodded and chuckled despite the fact that we were not in the most amusing of situations.

Looking back up to the carriage, I felt an unknown force pull me towards it to see what it contained - if anything. Behind me, I heard the beginnings of another petty argument between Mark and Eddie, and the other's attempts to try and intervene. Only Steve felt the curiosity, and like me approached to take a closer look at the carriage.

The horses stirred and both leant their heads forwards towards me as a form of some kind of greeting. I held out my hands, palms downwards, for them to sniff and decide whether I was to be trusted. I had been taught to do this from my mother when we used to go to the stables in the country to take care of Marmy, our stallion. It was important to show that you meant no harm, as they were very strong animals with a will of iron even after being broken, and they would not hesitate to cause any damage if they thought that you were a threat. Not all horses are like this, usually they are very well natured but one can never be too sure. Personally I preferred the wild horses.

I heard the horses snort and nuzzle their noises in my hands and knew that I had made two more friends. Smiling, I looked up at Steve and motioned to him to do the same. He just stood hesitantly behind me, casting wary glances at the mares. It was then that I realised he was indeed scared of horses. I couldn't help but stifle a laugh, which didn't really help his uneasiness.

"I thought that you weren't afraid of anything!" Steve frowned and rested both his hands on his hips.

"Well, I didn't say that I'm not scared of everything... it's just, all of you lot made that assumption because I happen not to believe in ghosts and stuff..." There was a pause as he thought how to justify his argument, "...and I'm not scared of the dark, unlike _some_ people!" I quirked my eye brow and scoffed at his last comment.

"Are you implying that I'm afraid of the dark? I think you've mistaken me for Hannah and Laura. Just because I'm a girl, doesn't mean-"

"-I didn't mean it like that! Please don't go into that feminist phase again! I already had to suffer yesterday, by hearing you ranting on for thirty minutes about 'prejudice and equality'." He said exasperated.

"There was a reason behind that! And feminists are much worse." I argued, pointing an accusing finger in his direction.

"I only suggested that I should help you carry a few _very _heavy boxes of yours into your new apartment. Then before I knew it, I was given a lecture about how women aren't all weak, blah blah...I hadn't even thought of it that way. I was trying to help out a _friend_." I was just about to fire back when I realised he was right, and gave in.

"Alright, alright!" I held my hands up in the air, showing my surrender. "Maybe, sometimes I jump the gun a bit. I'm sorry."

"Good. I'm glad we got that settled. See, your not always right you know." I shot him a deathly glare. Even the horses behind me tossed their heads back and forth threateningly and Steve took a few steps back.

"Don't push it!" Steve just gave me an innocent puppy eyed look and threw me a charming toothy grin. Knowing this look all too well, I sighed and rolled my eyes at him.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist." I slapped him playfully on the arm and turned around to pat the horses again.

"Why don't you just come up nearer to them? They won't hurt you - as long as I'm here." I laughed. However, Steve was not amused.

"When I was a kid...I witnessed an accident and I've been afraid of horses ever since." I turned my head around and saw his eyes pleading at me not to go on about it. Whatever had happened to him had obviously been very traumatic, so I gave him a sympathetic smile and changed the subject.

"Let's see what's in here then." I said as I indicated to the carriage. Steve let out a sigh of relief and carefully walked round me to get past the horses and inspect their burden. After giving the horses a final pat on their noses, I followed him to the carriage door window and took a peek inside. Now here came another unexpected surprise.

"Are you seeing what I'm seeing?" I asked shakily to Steve who was too dumbfounded to speak, but just nodded his head, confirming that I had not just lost my mind.

Inside, the carriage was packed right up to the ceiling with all of our equipment. When I say _all _of our equipment, I mean our guitars, amplifiers, laptops, speakers, recording studio equipment; the full drum set...everything. Even a few of my friends' possessions were in there that they had taken to stay at my flat for the night. It was as if we were on a tour but had a horse drawn carriage rather than a couch. I was surprised that only two horses were attached to it. I thought that surely all of our _stuff_ would be too much of a burden for them.

"Steve, if passers by see what's in here...goodness knows what they will think!" Steve, still shocked, took a while to register what I had said. When he did, he looked around the window in the door of the carriage to see if there were any shutters. Then he opened the door and found inside that there was a small brown blind that could be tugged down using a piece of string that hung off it with a round metal handle attached. He grapped hold of the handle and pulled the blind down and closed the door, checking that it was down far enough that no one could see through. After he had figured this out, I did the same on the other side of the carriage where there was another door.

"I'm surprised that none of the stuff fell out when we opened the doors." Steve muttered. "This is just too weird. Rachelle...what do you think the meaning of this is? We travel back in time, to a different continent, the entire band is here and with all of our equipment! It just doesn't make sense." Not knowing and not wanting to contemplate the question asked, I tried to change the subject.

"If you think about it, the world altogether is rather strange, isn't it? Actually, what is weird? And what is normal? Why-"

"Rachelle! Try and be serious here." I inhaled sharply. I hated thinking about such deep questions. When I started thinking about the reasons behind why things happen, I usually find it hard to think of anything else. It was suffocating because there seemed to be no real answer, so why try and answer this one?

"I don't know what the meaning of this is. You might as well ask what the meaning of life is! I've always said that there is no meaning to life, so just live it. Maybe we should do the same here." Steve was silent for a few minutes and then spoke again.

"I suppose your right. Let's not think of these questions...for now anyway." I nodded. It was then that I became aware of the others again behind us. Turning around, I indicated to Steve to follow me.

"We'll have to tell the rest what we've found!" I said excitingly, trying to force those troublesome questions out of my mind. As we approached them again, I heard Eddie speak urgently.

"...Why don't we knock on someone's door now? I don't want to wait out here in the cold for the sun to come up and people to come out. That could still be in ages yet. Then we can force our way through their house, tie them up on a chair and force answers out of them. We can threaten them if we need to - you never know whether they'll be telling the truth or not!"

"Eddie!" He jumped about 3 inches off the ground at hearing my voice and I couldn't help but chuckle a little. Then I tried to resume sounding serious, "That's quite enough. We are not going to go knocking down someone's door and torture them!"

"Well, it's not as if we would inflict pain...just threaten-"

"-That's out of the question! We don't want them reporting us to the police and get caught and accused for...whatever they might accuse us of!" Now that had shut him up. Eddie had not had a very good experience with police in his past. No doubt, he didn't want to relive anything from it. This made me wonder if the French 'gendarmes' in 1886 would be any different. Then Steve carried on,

"You've all seen that carriage up there?" He pointed his finger up the street and everyone nodded, thinking it was nothing of any significance. "Well, inside is our...our equipment."

"What!" Hannah exclaimed whilst her hand flew to her mouth.

"You heard him. It's got all our stuff in it. Everything!" I said.

"What do you mean...'all of our equipment'? That's impossible!"

"Mark, it's got your bass guitar in it...and mine, and Laura's. Eddie's drum kit is in there too, including Hannah's laptop and sound recording equipment, you name it. It's _all_ there. And don't ask me why!" As I had predicted, everyone was absolutely mortified. The same as Steve and I had been before.

"Shush, you guys! We don't want to wake anybody up and attract any unwanted attention. We're being far too loud." Hannah advised wisely. I must admit, that I myself had been very loud - but who could blame us? I was surprised that no one had fainted yet!

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**So there is the first chapter! Please R&R as any constructive criticism may be helpful for me:) Or, you could just R&R to say nice things - that would also be greatly appreciated, teehee :)**


	2. Que?

**Heyo peeps! Just before you read this, in case you don't know what "Voulez-vous couchez avec moi, ce soir?" means, it's "Would you sleep with me tonight?" hehe, if you didn't know that, then you might have got a little confused as to why this old man gets offended later on :) **

** I'm sorry that I haven't directly translated the French words straight away, but I just wanted you readers to get the feeling of how Eddie has no idea what's being said...all will become clear soon enough :)**

**Also, I used the google language tools to translate some stuff into French, which really isan't very good - so please forgive me if any of the grammar is incorrect!! I am learning French at school, but I just don't have the time to work it out myself :( Anyways! On with the story! OoooOOoo, and I almost forgot, The Phantom will be making an appearance soon!! It's just, I have to take the characters to the Opera House first! hehe**

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However, Hannah's efforts to quieten us down were in vain. Just three houses up the street we heard the opening and slamming of a door and the sound of hurried footsteps. We all simultaneously stopped talking, moving and even breathing. It had just dawned on me and probably the rest of the band, by the looks on their faces that we were going to meet a person from the past - if this indeed was not all a trick. That may not sound very thrilling at first, but it was to us. Probably back (or forward) in our time, that person's grave must be lying around somewhere in some forgotten church yard.

I looked to my right to see who was approaching and almost laughed out loud at the sight. An old man, probably in his sixties, came shuffling towards us at an incredible speed, waving a stick around in one hand as if to shoo us away. He had white hair that stuck out at all sorts of odd angles, and much was the same for his bushy eyebrows. Also it seemed that he was still wearing his night robe, which looked more like a plain white dress that was obviously way to long for him, as his stumbled over the hem of this garment several times on his way down to us. Then he started talking some gibberish, completely unaware that we could not understand him at first in the slightest.

We all glanced at each other, wondering what on earth was being said because he was talking so fast and in such an aggravated manner - it was impossible to decipher what language it was. Then, thinking myself the most foolish person in the world, I realised what language this man was speaking in...French! Hence, we were in Paris, France. Now I listened more closely, but I only picked out,

"Que faites-vous ici a ce moment de nuit?" Which I guessed he was asking something along the lines of what we are doing here at this time of night. However, before I could try and answer the man's question, Laura interrupted my train of thought.

"Hey you guys. I think he's talking French."

"Vous etes trop fort. Les gens essayent de dormir!" The old man carried on ranting oblivious to the fact that hardly any of us were listening, except from me who understood very little of what was being said like, that we were _being too loud_ and _people are trying to sleep._

"Well what are you expecting me to do? I can't say one single darn thing in French except from 'voulez-vous couchez avec moi, ce soir?'" Eddie retorted, in his usual cynical tone. It was not until the old man heard the last thing that Eddie said that he suddenly stopped his ranting.

"Pardon?" He looked at Eddie curiously. This unnerved Eddie and he looked at me for help.

"Well, aren't you supposed to be half French? Why is he looking at me like that? Talk to him!" Before I could, I was interrupted once again. This time the old man looked even more furious than ever, his cheeks were flaming red as carried on rambling.

"Comment grossier! Comment pourriez-vous demander une telle chose? Impliquez-vous quelque chose? Que je suis un homosexuel!" Eddie nudged me on the arm and whispered in my ear, whilst trying to force a smile in the man's direction - thinking that this would mask the fact that he had no idea what he was talking about.

"Well...what is he saying?" I covered my head in my hands in embarrassment of the situation. Eddie obviously had not a clue about what he had just said which left me with no choice but to have the horrible task of explaining.

"Vous pensez cet amuser?" The man asked at seeing Eddie grinning. _I probably will find this funny looking back at this moment in the future, _I thought.

"What you said in French means 'will you go to bed with me tonight?' and the man finds that very offensive. He says that your rude and asks how you could ask such a thing. He also thinks that you're implying that he is a homosexual. And for goodness sake, wipe that ridiculous grin off your face! He finds that offensive too - he thinks that you find this funny...when it's not!" After I had explained, Eddie's smile had faded and instead his mouth was left gaping open. Now that I had successfully shut Eddie up for what I estimated would be a few minutes, I turned to the gruff looking man to apologize.

I took a deep breathe, trying to find an excuse for why Eddie said what he did and why we were making such a big racket earlier. _Just say anything, _I thought urgently. _Even if it's the most __stupid thing ever! _

"Je fais des excuses, satisfais pardonne mon ami, il a souffert des dommages sérieux de cerveau et ne peut pas penser correctement. Je suis désolé au sujet du bruit plus tôt. Nous essayions de le calmer vers le bas parce qu'il a pensé qu'il était un poisson, et essayait de trouver l'eau." The man gave a concerned glance in Eddie's direction and then looked back up at me. I shrugged my shoulders and concluded, "Il est un retard."

"Il appartient dans une maison folle! Pas dans la rue." Judging by the look on the old man's face, he had bought it. I let out a breathe that I didn't even realize that I had been holding. _That was a close one!_

"Oui." I agreed. "Malheureusement, j'ai une responsabilité au-dessus de lui, parce qu'il est mon frère." At this comment, the man gave me a sympathetic look. Then I found that it was the perfect time to start asking the man a few questions of my own, now that I had convinced him that we were not causing trouble.

"Pourriez-vous me dire quelle année c'est, et où nous sommes?"

"L'année est dix-huit quatre-vingts six et vous êtes à Paris." Then he looked at me puzzled. "Pourquoi demandez-vous?"

"Mon frère pense qu'il est en Etats-Unis et que c'est l'année 2007. J'ai voulu qu'il entendît la vérité de quelqu'un d'autre parce qu'il pense que nous nous trouvons." The man gave Eddie another wary look and then nodded at me, bidding farewell. Before he went, he looked up and down at my clothing that he had not taken in until then. He raised his eyebrows as if shocked and I suddenly became aware of the fact that 19th century people might find our clothing rather eccentric and revealing in some areas...and probably the old man hadn't seen a woman in trousers before! This made me feel slightly uncomfortable as I was wearing tight jeans. Without another word the man turned on his heel and went back into his house, whilst muttering something under his breathe along the lines of _youths today being nothing but trouble _and _what has the world come to? _After this humiliating experience, I whipped round to face Hannah and Mark who were trying to secretly supress their fits of laughter.

"I thought you two learnt French in high school! You could have helped me back then. He almost didn't believe me!" After my outburst, they could no longer contain themselves and laughed out loud.

"It's just, y-you de-dealt with i-it so well. I-I don't think we cou-could have done any b-better." Hannah said between giggles. Mark was laughing so hard that he couldn't say a thing, but just nodded in agreement.

"So, what did you say?" Eddie demanded impatiently.

"Well, first I apologized on your behalf for saying what you did before. I told him that you have been suffering from a serious brain injury and cannot think properly. I also apologized for the noise that we had made earlier, and said that we had been trying to calm you down because you thought you were a fish and you were looking for water. I also said that you're a retard..." Eddie scowled. "...which is actually partially true."

"Oh thanks a lot Rachelle, for making me sound like the craziest lunatic on earth!"

"No problem, anytime mate! Oh, and the old man said that you belong in a mad house and not in the streets."

"What! That stupid son of a bi-" Thankfully, Laura had luckily clamped her hand over Eddie's mouth as he was shouting loudly, and we didn't want any other unfriendly encounters.

"Anyway, I said that I couldn't put you in a mad house because you are my brother and that I feel a responsibility over you. After I was sure that the guy was convinced by my explanation, I asked him what year it is and where we are. Turns out, we were correct. It's the year 1886 and we are most definitely in Paris."

"Oh my god! It's true..." Steve gasped.

"I'm afraid so."

"But how are we supposed to get back?" Hannah said in a more serious tone, now that she had recovered from her laughing fit. "...and how the hell did we get here?"

"Good questions...ones that unfortunately, I am unable to answer." I remarked hopelessly. Just then, I heard a thud to my left and saw that Laura had fainted. Mark went over to lift her up from the hard cobbled stones to make sure she had not hurt herself. Obviously these events were proving far too much for her to stand.

"I was waiting for that to happen." I said amused

"Didn't that old fella find it odd that you asked what year it is and where we are?" Steve questioned.

"Oh yeah, he did. I just told him that Eddie or 'my brother' thought that we were in America in the year 2007, and didn't believe us when we told him that we weren't. I said that I wanted the truth to be told by someone else to show that we were not lying. And so he let the matter pass, but it was a narrow miss!" At this, Mark looked up at me amazed whilst Laura's head was lying on his lap.

"Wow, tell me about it! You're really good at making stuff up out of the top of your head. I could never have done that in a million years!" I scowled in his direction.

"Well, _try _next time. I only barely managed to do it! And as we have no idea how to get back to our time, it seems we're going to be staying here for a long while, which means..." I glanced at Steve and Eddie, "...that you two and Laura are going to have to start learning some French." They both groaned in protest. Then Mark tapped me on the shoulder with a look of realization on his face.

"Rachelle, we need to find a place to stay and some place to work so that we can get food!" We all stood still at the mention of this. If we were going to survive and not become beggars wandering the streets, we needed to start earning some money. The problem was, where? We had only just arrived, and knew not where to go or what to do. We also needed to buy 19th century clothing to make ourselves look less conspicuous, and how could we do that without money?

"We'll just have to ask around different areas, and hope that there will be a job waiting for us." I thought about what Hannah had suggested and knew that it would be far harder done than said.

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**I realized that in my last chapter, Rachelle says "Rum..." rather than "Urm...", which you might have found quite strange! Sometimes I really hate spell check:)**


	3. Ideas and memories

**Oh dear, how could I forget?!! Please don't sue me-I have literally no money!  
**

** Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from the different versions of The Phantom of the Opera that have influenced my writings. If I did own any of them, especially Erik, do you think I would share him with you lot? Nope! Though I might be very generous and allow you to send him a virtual hug, teehee :)**

** There's actually gonna be some of Erik in this chapter! Mind you, a very depressed Erik :( This is when everyone should go "Awwww!" **

** Anyways, soon there will be a lot more action from his part so stay tuned! Well..not tuned, but- you know what I mean :) Oh, and hope all ya peeps have a nicer weekend compared to mine, which is mainly going to consist of me doing 3 things; work, work and work...ah well, such is life! Now on with the story!!**

* * *

At last, the first few golden rays of light shone up from the horizon and through the gaps between the numerous buildings that crowded around the city. The sky glowed a fiery orange and yellow colour in the east where the sun was beginning to rise. Birds began to chirp and sing joyfully to one another at the dawn of this new day and for us, new life. The atmosphere seemed so serene and cheerful that for a time, I forgot all about our predicament. I thought that maybe this wouldn't be such a bad thing after all - that we might learn something. 

We had all been sitting in a row at the edge of the pavement, waiting surprisingly patiently for the morning, each one of us buried in our own thoughts. All of us barely said two words to each other except from us occasionally making comments on how cold it was. This was rather odd, considering that usually when we were all together, we could speak for hours and never get bored - well, that just goes to show how much the event had affected us.

I had been pondering over Mark's worrying question for most of that time we spent in silence...wondering about what kind of jobs we could try to apply for. Maybe at a bakery, a school, a restaurant or cafe, a post office... but none of these possibilities really appealed to me. What were we going to do with all our musical equipment? Then I was suddenly struck with an idea! I was so excited by it that I even jumped off my seat at the edge of the road.

"Wow, someone's jumpy this morning. Want to find some bread to feed the ducks do you?" Eddie smirked as he cocked one of eyebrows up. The reason for this odd comment was that I was and still very much am, a lover of ducks - anything webbed footed and with a beak really! Usually I would have these random spurts of energy, which often resulted in me taking a trip to the nearest river of pond to say hello and feed my feathery friends. Even though his comment was meant to insult, I took no heed of it as there was a far more important issue on my mind. However, I swore to myself that I would deal with Eddie later...

"Mark! I've just had the most wonderful idea!" I jumped up and down whilst clapping my hands frantically to get his attention. Eddie looked at me in surprise for not reacting to his comment whilst the others cast worried glances to one another at my enthusiasm, as it wasn't like me to be so at such an early hour.

"Well...what is it?" Mark asked wearily as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes because he had been previously dozing off on Steve's shoulder.

"I just realized what we could do in order to earn money." Now that got Mark fully awake! At the mention of this, his head immediately shot up and his back straightened.

"Yes, yes! Go on!" He urged me eagerly.

"Urm...as we all went to Music College; I thought that we could apply our musical experience and skills in performing." I stated simply as it was the most logical thing to do.

"Yeah, but how are we supposed to go about that?" Hannah asked cynically.

"By going to the famous Opera House of course!" I exclaimed, waving my hands in the air, "According to what I learnt way back in my history classes, the Opera Populaire burnt down in 1884. Two years later, after being restored, it was opened again but under the name of the 'Opera Garnier'. That means it was re-opened in 1886...this very year!"

"Wow, you can count." I shot Eddie a deathly glare and then carried on.

"The new owner must be looking for people to audition for the play that'll be performed on its first opening night! This is our chance! We'll have a place to work, a steady income, including a roof over our heads! What more could you ask for?" For once, I was not met by any queries, doubts orsardonic remarks.

"Well, when do we start?" Laura inquired hopefully.

"Today!" I replied gleefully.

"Sounds great." Steve agreed, "I'm up for it...what about you guys?" We all formed a circle with Steve's hand outstretched in the middle. I put mine in followed by Hannah, Laura and Mark, but there was one hand missing. We all raised our heads and looked expectantly in Eddie's direction. He was always the last one to make a decision as he liked to think things through at his own pace. Finally, after a lot of silent pleas from us, Eddie's hand rested on the top and complained in his usual jokey fashion,

"They better have good food!" We all laughed at this as we lifted all our hands up into the air - our decision was final. If there was anything that we held onto the most, it was the need of us all sticking together... as a band and a group of friends.

"Opera Garnier, here we come!" I was just about to take a big step forward when I was stopped abruptly by a Laura's hand tugging at the sleeve of my jumper.

"Rachelle, we don't know where the Opera house is yet."

"Oh shit, yeah." I blushed at my foolishness. We didn't even know what the name of the street we were in!

* * *

Meanwhile, in the bowels of the now restored Opera Garnier, the angry pounding of an organ could be heard. The Phantom of the Opera was indeed still living and feverishly playing at his organ. Unfortunately, nothing but a jumble of mismatched notes and chords emanated through the vast cavern - enough to give anyone a headache for hours. Despite this, the Phantom prevailed and stubbornly hammered his fingers on the keys, searching for some kind of new song or melody to come into his mind. Alas, his attempts were futile for he had sadly lost his inspiration many years ago... 

Even the ache and protest within his fingers didn't stop him from playing. It wasn't until the memory of Christine flooded into his mind, did he stop. He leant his head back facing the ceiling, and closed his eyes to stop the tears from escaping and falling down his cheeks. _Too many times have I wept over her..._

"Damn me!" He cried. "Damn, _her_! Damn everyone and damn you God!" He raised his hands up to the heavens, "Why? Why my cursed face? What had I done to gain everyone's hatred from the moment that I was born? If you are as merciful as they say you are, then why torture me like this?" He opened his eyes and stared at the blank, rocky and cold ceiling as if hoping that _even_ it might give him an answer to all of his questions. However, there was no such reply and the Phantom sank helplessly off the organ stool and onto the floor. Burying his head in his hands, he started to sing. It was all but a muffle at first but then his voice became louder, clearer and full of agony.

"...Shamed into solitude  
Shunned by  
the multitude  
I learned to listen  
In my dark, my  
heart heard music

I long to teach the world  
Rise up and reach the world  
No one would listen  
I alone could hear the music

Then atlast, a voice in  
the gloom  
Seemed to cry, "I hear you!  
I hear your fears,  
Your torment and your tears!"

She saw  
my loneliness  
Shed in my emptiness  
No one would listen  
No one but her  
Heard as the outcast hears

No one would listen  
No one but her  
Heard as-s  
the o-outca-cast h-hears"

* * *

**Jeese! I just had to add that song in! It's so sad :( but cute :) at the same time. And by jove!! Would you believe it...I actually just got my first review! Thanks a bunch Kalaia! I'm glad you found that part amusing-cos it took me frickin ages to write!! haha :) So yeh, as I said again, if I had Erik locked up somewhere, I'd make him give you an uberly massive cuddly bear virtual hug, which would last about 5 minutes. hmmm, that would be nice :) -and I'm not bribing you other peeps to do the same...honest!! hehe **


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